Charles Manson Estate: FL Man Potential Heir Of Killer, Judge Rules

LOS ANGELES, CA — A Bradenton man claiming to be Charles Manson’s grandson is potentially an heir to the late mass murderer and cult leader, a California judge ruled.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Ruben Garcia said that Jason Freeman, 45, is Mason’s potential heir, but added that the claim is subject to further litigation.

"This court finds that Freeman is potentially an ... heir of [Manson] assuming [he] died [without a will] and petitioner [Dale] Kiken [temporary special administrator for Manson’s estate] can prove Charles Manson Jr. is the son of Charles Manson," the judge said in his written ruling.

Freeman’s claim came down to whether it can be proven that his father — from Charles Manson Jr., later known as Charles Jay White — was the killer’s son, City News Service reported. Garcia said that assertion ws satisfied based on a February 1986 order by an Ohio judge that Charles Manson Jr. pay child support to the Florida man’s mother.

Related Story: Bradenton Man Wins Right To Bury Grandfather, Charles Manson

Freeman’s claim to be the senior Manson’s heir was previously challenged by a former pen pal of the criminal and by a woman who said that she is the cult leader's sister.

In a Facebook post Saturday following Garcia’s ruling, Freeman shared an article about the news and said, “Wow, what a journey. One more step out of the way. The ball is moving forward.”

Freeman won the rights to his grandfather’s remains in 2018 after petitioning California courts for Charles Manson’s body.

The ashes of the notorious serial killer, who died Nov. 19, 2017, at 83, were spread on a California hillside following a private Christian funeral in Porterville, according to CNN.

Freeman's father was the progeny of Manson and his first wife, Rosalie Jean Willis, a waitress who married Manson in 1955. He was 20, and she was 15. Manson moved to California with his pregnant wife shortly afterward. He was serving a prison sentence for grand theft auto when his son, Charles Manson Jr., was born in 1956.

Charles Manson Jr. eventually took his stepfather's name and became Charles Jay White. He shot and killed himself on a Colorado highway in 1993.

Freeman, who grew up in Ohio and moved to Bradenton in 2017, barely knew his father. He told Patch in 2019 that he was haunted by his grandfather’s legacy his entire life.

"I struggled for many years with unanswered questions," Freeman said. "I felt like I was constantly running from the Manson curse that seemed to plague my bloodline."

Charles Manson was convicted of seven counts of first-degree murder and one count of conspiracy to commit murder in the August 1969 deaths of actress Sharon Tate, Leno and Rosemary La Bianca and four other people at the Tate residence: coffee heiress Abigail Ann Folger, photographer Wojciech Frykowski, hairdresser Jay Sebring and Steven Earl Parent, who was shot in his car on his way to visit an acquaintance who lived in a separate rented guest house on the Tate property.

Manson was given life in prison, though initially sentenced to death, and was denied parole a dozen times, reports said.

Several of his followers — Charles "Tex" Watson, Leslie Van Houten, Patricia Krenwinkel and the late Susan Atkins — were also convicted and sentenced to life in prison in California for the murders.

Patch editor D’Ann White contributed to this report. This story also includes reporting from Bill Hetherman with City News Service.